A Shocking Thing

245pp. "The stories in this book are all different. Some are funny, some touching. Some are about the end of the world, some about polite drawing-room conversations. Some astound you with a surprising ending, some build inexorably to a horrible climax. But they all have two things in common: each leaves you with a shudder of shock you won't soon forget and each is written by a master of the modern short story."